An official website of the United States government

World’s premier ground-based observations facility advancing atmospheric research

Data Discovery Data Sources Science Data Products Work with ARM Data Data Quality Program

Data / Science Data Products / VAPs

BEFLUX

Best-Estimate Radiative Flux

Baseline VAP

Best estimate of downwelling diffuse SW (top plot) and the differences between best estimate and instrument data (bottom plot) in the year 2000. In the top plot, the red curves mark the instances when SIRS C1 data were not used in the best estimate calculation. In the bottom plot, the red, blue, and green colors represent the differences of the best estimate value and the SIRS C1, E13, and BRS data, respectively.

The Best-Estimate Surface Radiative Flux (BEFLUX) VAP processes data from three Southern Great Plains Central Facility radiometer systems when all are available. Before 2001, this VAP used corrected diffuse SW from the DiffCorr1Dutt VAP as input. The 1-minute input data are compared to decide which to use for averaging to get the best estimate. The output data are saved in two NetCDF files containing the best estimate values, QC flags, and the difference fields.
For more details, see Best Estimate Radiation Flux Value-Added Procedure: Algorithm Operational Details and Explanations.

Primary Derived Measurements

Technical Report Browse Data

Contact

View all contacts

Damao Zhang
Translator Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

References

View all references

Creekmore et al. "Quantifying aerosol direct effects from broadband irradiance and spectral aerosol optical depth observations". 2014. 10.1002/2013jd021217.

Locations

Follow Us:

Keep up with the Atmospheric Observer

Updates on ARM news, events, and opportunities delivered to your inbox

ARM User Profile

ARM welcomes users from all institutions and nations. A free ARM user account is needed to access ARM data.

Data

About

Resources

Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) | Reviewed March 2025